National Network for Equitable Library Service

A mugger to a stranger, "Give me your wallet or I will beat you to pulp!" It is a crime. An employer says to a worker: "Adding lung-saving ventilation will reduce my profit. Give me back some of your wages and I will let you keep your lungs!" This is not a crime. Our assumptions about the world condition is to see these situations as legally different from one another. But what if we, the critics of corporate capitalism, instead insisted on taking the spirit of law, rather than its letter, seriously?

Unsettled Expectations is a critical multi-site ethnography that examines conflict over Indigenous land rights in Canada and the United States as a lens through which to understand historical and ongoing relationships between Indigenous and non-Indigenous peoples in settler colonies. The goal of the research is to try to understand the lived practices and discourses of people defending and countering indigenous land rights--as a grounded point of departure to examine the limits and possibilities of decolonization.

This volume addresses a wide range of topics related to Aboriginal resource use, ranging from the pre-contact period to the present. The papers were originally presented at a conference held in 1988 at the University of Winnipeg. Co-editor Kerry Abel has written an introduction that outlines the main themes of the book. She points out that it is difficult to know what the enshrinement of Aboriginal rights in the Canadian Constitution means without knowing exactly what constituted the Aboriginal interest in the land past and present.

"From diversity comes strength and wisdom": this was the guiding principle for selecting the articles in this collection. Because there is no single voice, identity, history, or cultural experience that represents the women of the First Nations, a realistic picture will have many facets. Accordingly, the authors in Women of the First Nations include Native and non-Native scholars, feminists, and activists from across Canada. Their work examines various aspects of Aboriginal women's lives from a variety of theoretical and personal perspectives.

Tug of War is the first book of its kind. Written by a sitting family court judge in layman’s language, it demystifies complex family law concepts and procedures, clearly explains how family court works, and gives parents essential alternatives to resolve their own custody battles and keep their kids out of the often damaging court system.

An important and timely recipe for hope for humans and all forms of life

Palila v Hawaii. New Zealand’s Te Urewera Act. Sierra Club v Disney. These legal phrases hardly sound like the makings of a revolution, but beyond the headlines portending environmental catastrophes, a movement of immense import has been building — in courtrooms, legislatures, and communities across the globe. Cultures and laws are transforming to provide a powerful new approach to protecting the planet and the species with whom we share it.

In the pre-reserve era, Aboriginal bands in the northern plains were relatively small multicultural communities that actively maintained fluid and inclusive membership through traditional kinship practices.

Today's justice system and the legal profession have rendered the "lawyer-warrior" notion outdated, shifting toward conflict resolution rather than protracted litigation. The new lawyer's skills go beyond court battles to encompass negotiation, mediation, collaborative practice, and restorative justice. In The New Lawyer, Julie Macfarlane explores the evolving role of practitioners, articulating legal and ethical complexities in a variety of contexts.

"[W]hen precisely does a duty to consult arise? The foundation of the duty in the Crown's honour and the goal of reconciliation suggest that the duty arises when the Crown has knowledge, real or constructive, of the potential existence of the Aboriginal right or title and contemplates conduct that might adversely affect it." Chief Justice Beverley McLachlin, Supreme Court of Canada, Haida Nation v. British Columbia, 2004.

Since the turn of the twenty-first century, Canadian unions have scored a number of important Supreme Court victories, securing constitutional rights to picket, bargain collectively, and strike. Unions in Court documents the evolution of the Canadian labour movement’s engagement with the Charter, demonstrating how and why labour’s long-standing distrust of the legal system has given way to a controversial, Charter-based legal strategy.